The Best Jewel Games Never Die

A gazillion years ago, at least it feels that long in memory, my computer was loaded up with games. Some of them came already loaded, and others I purchased along the way. Some of my favorite games were even shareware, and yes, I honored the developers and paid for some of them. A lot of hard work goes into developing a game, or writing a book, or even narrating a book.

But this isn’t about the little thank you of making sure that people who entertain you can actually feed their families, being paid for their hard work as with anyone who goes to a job. This post is about remembered games.

I’d completely forgotten about one of my old favorites, a game called Jewel Box. Even the music was soothing, and the song would stay in my head for hours after playing. I’d still have the Jewel Box game if we hadn’t been hit by lightning one year.

I’d gotten a new computer, but all of my best games were for an older operating system, so I kept the old computer and fixed it up in such a way as to switch back and forth between the two computers easily, with the same monitor and keyboard. Thank god for techie husbands!

The Jewel Box game had jewels in different colors of purple, white, green, orange, etc., each color with its own shape. Jewels came in strings of three if I remember correctly, and fell from the top of the window like Tetris pieces. The object was to keep the box cleared, and matching up the jewels would clear some of them out. Of course there was a lot more to it, with bonus points and magic jewels, easter eggs, and high scores and so forth.

What made me remember the jewel game was stumbling across a free game online called Bejeweled. It isn’t the same as my old friend, nor should it be. Every game is unique unto itself.

Bejeweled has color-coded jewels, each of a different shape. The round ones are white, the square ones are red, the octogons are orange, etc., and you swap the jewels around to create matches.

Online games have one advantage over games on your hard drive: lightning storms won’t blast all of your favorite games into oblivion, to where you can never play them again.

It’s good to know that games reminiscent of my favorite games are still out there, such as Bejeweled.